


Engulfed

by novelized



Category: Papillon (2018)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-03
Updated: 2019-03-03
Packaged: 2019-11-08 13:01:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17981840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/novelized/pseuds/novelized
Summary: “I’m going to run out of ways to thank you eventually,” Louis calls, which actually makes Papi halt. He turns back to look at him with raised eyebrows, the ghost of a smirk on his face.“I’m sure you’ll get creative.”





	Engulfed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GloriousGoblinQueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GloriousGoblinQueen/gifts).



It's sudden, the way it always was: jerked backwards, fingers clenched bone-breakingly tight around his wrist, something sharp pressed into the sensitive skin at the base of his spine, rancid breath in his ear. “I know where you keep that money,” said deep-voiced and foul, and fear seizes Louis’s entire body so rapidly he thinks he might choke on it, and maybe he should be used to this but he’s _not._ The pointed tip of whatever weapon his assailant is wielding drags downwards, dips under his waistband, just steady and deep enough to draw a thin line of blood, and the voice again, rife with amusement, “Think I just might enjoy getting it out of you.”

Louis is calculating his next move but coming up blank, his arm wrenched in a vicelock behind his back, starts hoping that it’s over quickly, at least, when the tip of the weapon presses in farther and he gasps out loud at the startling pain but then, all at once, it’s gone.

His wrist is abruptly released and he stumbles forward, whips his head around just in time to see Papillon’s fist driving straight into the man’s face, again and again and again, until he drops to his knees and spits red.

“Try that again and I’ll gut you,” Papi tells him, and just as aggressively he snatches at Louis’s uniform, yanks it up to inspect the damage on his back. “You hurt?” he asks, and Louis, still trembling, shakes his head no.

Without another word Papi drops his shirt and stalks off. Louis rights his glasses and hurries to catch up to him.

“I’m going to run out of ways to thank you eventually,” he calls, which actually makes Papi halt. He turns back to look at him with raised eyebrows, the ghost of a smirk on his sun-beaten face.

“I’m sure you’ll get creative,” he says, and any response Louis might’ve had dries up in his throat. It’s not what he’d expected, not from him, but then, he thinks, in a place like this, there wasn’t much else to lose.

\---

There is no such thing as privacy, here, so he waits for the closest they can get. Papi disappears behind some trees to take a leak mid-day and Louis glances around to see if any guards are watching and then, silently, follows after him. He’s not too far from the site, so they’ll have to be quiet. Papi’s just reaching for his pants when Louis steps on a fallen branch, and he whips around on high alert when it snaps under his boot. He relaxes, though, when he sees that it’s just Louis.

“Jesus Christ,” he says, wiping the sweat away from his forehead, “why you sneaking up on me like that?” 

Louis doesn’t respond. He takes a few measured steps forward, until he’s close enough to touch him, close enough to smell the lingering smoke on his breath. He pushes him gently back against the tree and then drops down to his knees.

“What’re you doing?” Papi asks, his voice low with confusion. “The fuck is happening, Dega?” 

This is not something Louis has done before. He met his wife when he was young and still bright-eyed and he’s been unfailingly devoted to her. But this is his reality now, and she’d understand if she knew, and he just needs to _stay alive_ and Papi is his best—his only—chance at survival, and so he squares his jaw and reaches with both hands for Papi’s waistband. Papi watches him like maybe he’s gone mad and then, just before his pants are dragged down low enough, he snatches Louis’s wrist.

“Not that I don’t appreciate the gesture,” he says firmly, “but what are you _doing_ , Louis?”

It’s the use of his first name that snaps him out of it. He looks up at Papi from his knees and says, after a beat, “You told me to be creative.”

“I told you...” Papi repeats, his voice trailing off in thought, and then, like a lightbulb flashing above his head, he bursts out into laughter. It is startlingly loud and so out of place that Louis has forgotten how to laugh with him in return. “Oh Jesus, I didn’t mean, not like _that._ Thought you’d give me half your bread at dinner or something. What kinda man you think I am? 

There is a twig digging into his shin. Louis stands up, unsure and unsteady, and looks at Papi. “Well, good,” he says. “Wasn’t exactly looking forward to it myself.”

Papi clocks him on the shoulder. “Get back to work, Dega,” he says. “I’ve gotta take a piss.”

Louis goes back the way he came, doesn’t turn around and look at Papi, a gnawing sensation in the pit of his stomach. He should feel relieved, he knows, that he doesn’t have to do this.

But he doesn’t.

\---

That night Louis has trouble sleeping. He’s gotten used to the cement block they call a bed, the rumbling snores from the other men, the near-constant hunger pains, the lower-leg cramps from having his ankle bolted to a metal bar all night. Those aren’t what’s bothering him. Tonight it’s all internal, his brain a jumbled mess. He rolls over on his side and looks at Papi.

Even through the dark he can see that he’s asleep, but fitfully. His eyes twitch behind his closed eyelids like he’s dreaming something terrible, his jaw perpetually clenched. Louis’s mouth feels dry. The only reason he can ever sleep at all is because he knows Papi’s nearby. Sometimes he’ll reach out blindly in the night just to touch him, just to make sure he’s still there. Usually Papi will shove his hand away but even that is reassuring.

This time he reaches out with intention. His fingers graze along Papi’s sleeve, light as a feather, up to his elbow, beyond. He stops and curls his hand around Papi’s bicep, waits for the inevitable complaint. Papi’s own hand comes up, settles over Louis’s. Squeezes his fingers. Doesn’t let go.

Louis’s gaze flickers to back to Papi. His eyes are still closed, but his face has relaxed. As if all along he’d been waiting for this. As if Louis isn’t the only one that needs the assurance.

Louis scoots infinitesimally closer, tips his forehead against their laced hands. Papi doesn’t protest. Finally, finally, Louis falls asleep.

\---

The guys mostly lay off him, now, because of Papillon, because of what they’ve seen him do. They don’t put their hands on him anymore. But the talk doesn’t stop. The insults don’t stop, once Papi’s out of earshot. Louis is taking a two minute break one day, his body aching from hours of backbreaking labor, dehydrated and underfed, when one of the big guys, Duval, sneers at him, “What’s the matter, ass still sore from taking it like a bitch last night?”

Louis lifts his head enough to look at him incredulously. “What?”

“I _said_ , are you in pain from your boyfriend fucking you like a worthless whore last night?”

Louis stands up calmly, feeling like he’s made of iron, doesn’t even care that it’s because he has Papi, just down the road. Doesn’t care that he’s paying someone else to fight his battles. Doesn’t care what anyone thinks about him. Just doesn’t care. He takes his glasses off and wipes them on his shirt. “How do you know,” he says evenly, “that I wasn’t the one fucking him?”

Duval’s mouth opens and closes stupidly, clearly unprepared for that sort of response. A few of the other guys snigger, unsure, but Duval looks at him with disgust. “You’re a fucking freak,” he says, and Louis just shrugs and heads back to work. He doesn’t feel so tired, all of a sudden.

“Maybe you should try it,” he says over his shoulder, wonders if he’ll pay for this later. “Ask one of your buddies. It might help dislodge the stick up your ass.”

\---

In the barracks that evening, Papi’s waiting for him at the foot of his bed, his eyebrows raised and his mouth drawn tight. Louis’s stomach gives an uncomfortable swoop.

“What?” he says, playing dumb, trying to move past him for his bed spot, but Papi grabs him by the neck of his shirt and pulls him back. Stares him down.

“You tellin’ people you’re fucking me?” he demands, and Louis wonders if he’s about to call the entire thing off, if he’s about to be on this side of one of Papi’s beatdowns for the very first time. Without Papi’s protection, he won’t make it through the night.

“It was a joke,” he says, fully aware that Papi’s still clenching a fistful of his shirt. “Just a joke. Look, I’m sorry.” 

“You’re sorry?” Papi repeats, his voice low and dangerous. A bead of sweat works its way down Louis’s back. “You’re _sorry_? You fuck me without even buying me dinner first and all you can say is you’re sorry?” 

“I—”

Louis breaks off and looks at Papi in amazement. Papi laughs out loud and lets him go. “Didn’t know you had it in you,” he says, slapping him light upside the head. “Don’t know where you get off thinking I’d ever let you fuck _me_ , but I’m impressed by your gall.” 

“They all think you’re fucking me,” he mumbles, climbing up onto the raggedy excuse for a sleeping pad. “Just thought it’d be nice if we switched every once in awhile.”

“Do I look like the kind of guy that switches?”

“I don’t know, Papi,” Louis says. “What kind of guy are you?”

Papi doesn’t respond right away. He climbs up beside Louis, dangles his ankle over the bar, already ready to be locked up like a fucking animal, pillows his head with one arm and then, at last, looks over at Louis. His expression is unreadable. “You play with fire,” he says, ignoring the question, “you almost always get burned.”

Louis rolls over on his back. Maybe, he’s starting to think, in a place like this, that wouldn’t be so bad.

\---

That night, half-asleep, he reaches out into the dark to make sure Papi’s still beside him. His hand lands somewhere along Papi’s sternum. Papi doesn’t shake him away but he does feel the slight shift of fabric under his fingers, so he knows that he knows he’s there.

Then, suddenly, Papi’s own hand stretches out. It comes to rest on the exposed skin at Louis’s hip, and he jumps at the touch but then doesn’t move. Barely breathes. Papi’s eyes don’t open, but his thumb presses down. Soft, at first, experimental, and then harder, and harder, digging deep into his skin, pushing hard enough to bruise. Louis makes a little gasping noise and all at once Papi lets go. His hand retreats, rubs tenderly at Louis’s wrist. His hip bone still smarts but he doesn’t pull away from Papi’s chest. 

When he drifts off, what feels like hours later, he dreams of a prison engulfed in flames.

\---

When he wakes up Papi’s already pulling his boots on, his back to Louis, and Louis tugs his shirt up just enough to survey his hip. He hadn’t dreamt it. There’s a perfect thumbprint, a soft shade of purple, marked into his skin. Louis traces it with his finger and when he presses down, it stings. He looks at Papi’s broad shoulders and tries to understand the meaning, any sort of message, but he comes up empty.

Papi turns to look at him suddenly, and Louis lets his shirt drop.

“Get a move on, Dega,” he says. “What do you think’s for breakfast? Pancakes? French toast? Something real hearty, I’m guessing, they love to feed us good.”

Louis reaches down for his own boots. “Bacon, probably,” he answers, even though his throat feels thick. “The crispy kind.”

Papi nods in agreement. “You like your bacon crispy too?” he says, and slaps him on the back. “Knew I liked you for a reason.”

He doesn’t wait for Louis to join him. He’s halfway across the barracks before Louis can even start to ask _why_.

\---

Another day, another work detail. They haven’t talked about escape much lately, but Louis knows it’s always there, percolating in the back of Papi’s mind. Louis doesn’t speak much today. Hardly listening, either; he thinks one of the big-mouthed guys throws an insult at his back but he doesn’t even catch it, so he doesn’t give a damn. He waits until he sees Papi break away from the group, head into the trees again. Without even consciously making the decision, Louis does what he does best: he follows him.

This time Papi senses him coming. He doesn’t look alarmed. He grins, slow and easy, like he’d expected him all along. “Gonna get yourself a reputation,” he says, nodding towards the guys.

“I don’t care,” Louis answers. 

“No. I didn’t think you did.”

Louis steps forward. He is less unsteady, less unsure. He lowers himself to his knees. Papi looks exasperated but doesn’t stop him.

“Didn’t we already go over this?”

“Yes,” Louis says. He puts his hands on Papi’s hips.

Papi immediately covers them with his own, like he’s going to wrench them away. “What’d I tell you, Dega?” he says, looking at him full-on. “I’m not like that.”

“How do you know?”

“What?”

“Playing with fire,” Louis says knowingly. He digs his fingernails into Papi’s waistband, and Papi’s grip on him slackens. “Maybe you’ve just never learned to light a match.”

“Jesus Christ,” Papi murmurs, but not angry. More like he’s accepted it. He lets go. Louis slides his pants down to his feet.

“You marked me,” Louis says, and he may not know what he’s doing but it feels natural, like this; it feels right. He wraps his hand around him and doesn’t miss the subtle way his breath catches. It’s been too long since any of them have been touched. Seems like it should be an unalienable right. “You _claimed_ me,” he adds, twisting his wrist. “That’s why you gave me that bruise, isn’t it, Papillon?” He draws his name out, slow and sweet and heavy on his tongue.

“Fuck,” Papi hisses, his hand tangling up into Louis’s curls. 

“You never correct them,” Louis adds, speeding up and slowing down intermittently, his eyes on Papi’s face. “When they call me your boyfriend. Your bitch. You’ve never once corrected them.” 

“Louis,” Papi says, and it, once again, jolts straight down his spine. “We can’t—they’re going to notice—have to hurry…”

Louis knows he’s right. He’d draw this out all day if he could, stay in this moment for too long, but he knows what they could do to them, isn’t stupid enough to risk it. So without saying another word he wraps his mouth around him, and Papi’s fingers tighten in his hair, and it’s sloppy and inexperienced but still doesn’t take long for Papi to be carried to the edge, for his body to go slack against the tree, for Louis to pull off and wipe his mouth with the back of his hand and nod impressively up at him. He winces when he climbs back up off his knees.

“Well?” he says, adjusting his glasses, trying to flatten down his hair.

Papi just smirks at him and doesn’t offer to help. They move back towards their work detail, slip silently through the rocks. “Well what?”

A smile, a real smile, stretches across Louis's lips. “How’s it feel to be burned?”

\---

When Louis is face-down in the moss, later, his back torn apart by the lick of the guard’s whip, and Papi running through the trees alone, he thinks of that moment. He calls Papi’s name in an unsteady voice, but it doesn’t matter. He’s already gone. 

**Author's Note:**

> i didn't get a chance to participate in yuletide last year, but i HAVE been on a mission to watch as many rami malek movies as possible. after finishing papillon i knew i wanted to write fic, and when i stumbled across [gloriousgoblinqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gloriousgoblinqueen)'s prompt i was hooked. hope you don't mind a gift three months late!


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